


Parasite

by visser13



Category: Among Us (Video Game)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Gen, We take the silly video game and we make it very serious
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-23
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:02:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27114401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/visser13/pseuds/visser13
Summary: The crew of The Skeld are heading for Polus when an unidentified lifeform is detected on the ship. It vanishes soon after, but things begin going desperately wrong, and it becomes apparent that someone on the mission is no longer the person they were when the ship took off.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 13





	1. Unidentified Lifeform

They let everyone pick their own colour for their suits. Said it wasn’t supposed to feel like a uniform. Said we could personalize it. But on these missions, where the air quality is so low you can’t ever take it off, the suit stops being an expression of your personality, and it starts being who you are.

So whoever you were before, that doesn’t matter. Whatever your name was before, that doesn’t matter. You can’t even see faces through the damn helmets. You come to the station a person. You leave it a colour.

So when Pink wakes up that morning, they don’t think of the name or the life they left on Earth. They just think of the job they have to do — and the pay-check that will be waiting for them at the end of all of this.

They’ll be leaving on The Skeld today, their first time leaving the station since they arrived. Their destination is Polus, somewhere Pink has never been before. They don’t know much about it, except that it’s cold. But the suits are heated, so that shouldn’t matter.

Only six of them will be going on this mission, which is the minimum number of people needed to keep The Skeld functional, although functional is a stretch. The damn thing barely works. Unlike the station, where you can at least be yourself in your room, it’s not safe to take your suit off for even a moment on that ship, so as they’re brushing their teeth, Pink takes one last look at their face. It will be a while before they get to see it again, or any human face, really.

The rest of the team is waiting on them in the loading bay.

“Late again, huh?” Yellow throws an arm around Pink’s shoulder, and Pink can hear the grin in their voice as they say it.

“Time got away from me,” Pink says, shrugging off the affectionate gesture, though they appreciate it.

“Well, now that Pink has decided to show up, we can actually get going,” Red says. Her arms are folded in an attempt to look stern, but she isn’t fooling anyone. She is the de-facto leader, because the group had been told they needed to pick a leader for this mission, and the red ranger was usually the leader in all the Power Rangers shows, so she seemed like the obvious choice.

“Joy.” Orange says, sounding like she thinks this is anything but a joy. Pink can imagine her rolling her eyes. If they’re not mistaken, they can hear the sound of her chewing gum over the comms, and they don’t appreciate the ASMR.

“Don’t be like that, Orange,” Purple says, a pleading tone in his voice. “It won’t be that bad.”

“Sure.”

Green doesn’t say anything, but that isn’t a surprise. He’s the newest recruit on the station, and he hasn’t had a chance to get to know everyone yet. He’ll warm up to them all once they’re on the Skeld together. No private quarters to hide in. Nothing but a twelve hour flight from the station to Polus, where they all have to deal with the fact that the ship is basically falling apart. Pink hasn’t made the trip themself yet, but they’ve heard enough from Yellow to know that they’ll basically be running around like mad just trying to keep everything running. There’s a reason it comes with such a steep pay bonus. But the risk of dying is apparently pretty low. Under 20%. So Pink can’t complain.

* * *

Take off is pretty smooth, all things considered. Green’s safety harness was busted and he ended up getting thrown halfway across the ship, but it wasn’t like he died. Once the ship clears the gravitational pull of the station, and Yellow stops laughing at him, the rest of the crew help him up, he’s as good as new, if a little cranky.

“Alright, meeting in the cafeteria,” Red says, trying to put some authority into her voice. As if that’s necessary. Everyone is gonna listen to her anyway. The crew trudges after her, everyone trying to get used to the slightly weaker gravity in The Skeld. It’s supposed to have the same amount of artificial gravity as the station, so that must be busted, too.

The cafeteria area is almost comically out of place on the ship, looking like it was dropped here straight from a high school. It’s also far too big to be necessary, given the number of people the ship typically has on it. And they can’t even take their suits off to eat, so Pink isn’t entirely sure why this room exists. Or maybe the air quality on The Skeld wasn’t supposed to be so shitty that helmets were required 24/7. Maybe that’s a bug, and not a feature. Who can really say.

“First class accommodations,” Yellow says, knocking Pink with their shoulder. “You’ll get used to it, man.”

“It’s not bad,” Pink says, even though it is.

“Liar.”

Pink grins, but of course, Yellow can’t see it.

“You each have assigned tasks,” Red raises her voice slightly, to indicate that it is time to listen to her now. “The comm unit in your suit will update you on what needs to be done in real time. So just follow the instructions and you should be fine. We’ll arrive at Polus in about twelve hours... More or less. The propulsion in this thing isn’t exactly consistent.”

“It took almost twenty hours last time,” Orange points out, her tone completely flat.

“Closer to more than less,” Red admits. “You can refill your suit’s nutrient pellets and water stores here in the cafeteria, though they should be stocked enough to last at least twenty-four hours, and the trip to Polus has never taken that long.”

“First time for everything, right?” Yellow says, but unlike Orange, they sound amused.

“Oh, I hope not,” Purple is pulling at a loose thread on his suit.

“Well, time flies when you keep busy,” Red tries to clap their hands together for emphasis, but the padded suit just makes a sad little _thwump_ when she does so. “Your tasks aren’t going to do themselves, and the ship isn’t going to ever make it to Polus if we don’t keep it running.”

There’s no more room for discussion, clearly, and Green, Red, Orange, and Purple all silently rise to their feet and head off throughout the ship. The comm unit in Pink’s suit has already popped up a list of tasks, and they see that they can open a map of the ship, as well. Helpful, since they have no idea where anything is.

“Honestly, it’s not that hard,” Yellow stretches as they stand up, bending backwards slightly to crack their spin in that way Pink hates. The bulkiness of the suit stops them from doing it properly. “Just follow the little instructions, and if something goes wrong, there’s a button in here,” They point to the table in the centre of the cafeteria. “Just slam that button and everyone will come running, and we can figure out whatever trouble you ran into.”

“Think we’ll be needing it?” Pink asks, eyeing the emergency meeting button warily.

“Nah,” Yellow shakes their head. “It basically never gets used. The Skeld may be a piece of shit, but it’s not dangerous.”

Pink nods. They feel better with Yellow here, at least. It’s hard to make friends when you barely acknowledge who you are outside of the suit, but Pink feels like Yellow is as close as they have come to friendship since arriving at the station.

“Anyway, I’m needed in electrical,” Yellow says. “See you around, man. Try to have fun with it, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Pink says, but they don’t exactly put their heart in it. They almost want to call out to Yellow, as they disappear down the hallway, and ask if the two of them can stick together. But of course they can’t. They each have their own tasks that need to be done, and it would take far too long if they tried to do them without splitting up.

Pink’s first ever task on The Skeld is as unglamorous as could be. Emptying the garbage in the in the cafeteria and bringing it down to the air lock. There are no environmental protections in place for space yet, not that people aren’t furiously trying to draft them. But nothing has gone through, so for now, all garbage and waste is ejected out the airlock.

When Pink first arrived on the station, the airlock terrified them. Just the concept of a door that led out into the vast, empty void of space gave them nightmares. But the airlock is as mundane as everything else now, and as they head down towards The Skeld airlock with the garbage from the cafeteria (why was there already garbage when they only just boarded the ship?) they are barely paying attention to their surroundings.

This is perhaps one of their worst habits, and over the years it has caused no end of trouble for them. And because they aren’t paying attention, it is only after they pull the lever to open the inner airlock door that they notice that the window looking into the airlock appears to be covered with... something.

At first, they think that someone has painted the window from the ship into the airlock chamber black, which would be odd, but people have done odder things on the station. Cabin fever affects everyone differently. But once the door opens, they realize that it is more like a strange black slime. And it’s moving. Only slightly, shuddering and quivering, and maybe the movement is caused by the door opening, but it makes Pink uncomfortable. Whatever this stuff is, mold or jello gone wrong, they don’t want to be anywhere near it.

They take a step back, and that seems to be all it takes to spur the gunk into action. It moves faster than something without any visible limbs, or really a body, has any right to. It drops off the door, hitting the floor with a disgusting _splat_ , and pauses in front of Pink, as though considering them. Whatever this slime is, Pink realizes it is alive, in some way or another, and that they need to inform everyone on the ship immediately of its presence. And, more importantly, they need to get the hell away from it as quickly as possible. It twitches once, twice, and before it can reveal whatever its plan was, Pink chucks the bucket of garbage at it and bolts. They run faster than they honestly thought they were capable of, run back to the button that Yellow had pointed out to them only moments prior.

They ignore the EMERGENCIES ONLY sticker next to the button, since they’re pretty sure an alien lifeform aboard The Skeld counts as an emergency, and they slam their hand on the button.

The alarm that blares throughout the ship is beyond obnoxious, impossible to ignore. Orange and Red are the first to show up, and for once Pink is glad they can’t see anybody’s facial expression, since they can sense the annoyance radiating off the pair. But they don’t care, can’t care. There’s something in the ship that needs to be dealt with.

Purple is the next to arrive, and he comes and stands next to the other two, joining them in staring at Pink, waiting for an explanation. But Pink waits, because they want everyone there. They need everyone to know. And because they want Yellow there. Yellow will believe them. They’re not sure anyone else will.

Yellow arrive, and their gait is almost casual, as if nothing out of the ordinary is happening. They, too, say nothing, as everyone seems to understand that the whole crew needs to be there before the meeting can start.

Green is the last to arrive, and he takes long enough that Pink wonders where he could have been. The ship isn’t that big.

“Alright, Pink,” Red says, and she sounds mildly exasperated. “What is it.”

“There was... There was something in the airlock,” Pink speaks carefully, needing their words to be listened to, and not dismissed out of hand. “When I opened the airlock to dispose of the garbage from the cafeteria, there was some sort of black slime in there, and it came into the ship.”

Silence greets their explanation, and they know that their crewmates do not believe them.

“Black slime?” Red says, finally.

“Yes.”

“Did you really push the emergency meeting button because you saw some mold?” Orange asks.

“No, it, it wasn’t mold,” Pink shakes their head emphatically. “It moved on its own. It came into the ship.”

Silence. Silence. Silence.

“Show us,” Yellow says, and they sound less mocking than Orange, which is nice.

“I don’t have time for this,” Orange complains.

“It could be something worth looking into,” Yellow shoots back. “There aren’t many alien lifeforms in this sector, but that doesn’t mean there are none. And if this becomes a problem later, we’ll look really stupid for ignoring Pink’s warning.”

Pink feels at that moment like they could kiss yellow, if it weren’t for the fact that several inches of shatterproof space-safe plastic separated their faces.

“Yellow is right,” Red says. “Come on, let’s get this done quickly.”

“I was in the middle of a task,” Purple comments, their tone far more melancholy than getting interrupted while rewiring an electrical panel warrants.

As a group they head towards the airlock, Pink jumping at every shadow, Yellow stifling laughter at their jumpiness.

As the airlock comes into view, Pink’s heart sinks. There is nothing there. Where the black slime had been, there is only the overturned garbage bin, surrounded by the cafeteria waste that they were supposed to be throwing out.

“There’s nothing here, man,” Yellow says, and they sound legitimately sorry, but that doesn’t help, because Pink knows what they saw and they know they aren’t wrong.

“Uh,” They swallow, looking around for an explanation. Their eyes fall upon the vent, part of the interconnected system that provides (rather low quality) air to the entirety of the sip. “The vent!”

“What?” Red is starting to sound annoyed now.

“It could have gone into the vent,” Pink explains, clinging to this answer now, sure its true. “With the vent, it could have gone... Oh. It could have gone anywhere.” That is a terrifying thought, now that Pink has had it, and they can imagine the gunk sliding its way through the air system, looking for someone to... to do whatever gunks do to them.

“Pink...,” Purple’s tone is kind. “Do you think, maybe, you were imagining things?”

“I wasn’t,” Pink shakes their head again, looking desperately to Yellow for help. “I definitely saw something.”

“Look,” Yellow steps forward, answering Pink’s silent call for help. “We can just go check admin, right? It’ll tell us where every lifeform on the ship is. If there’s something lurking in the vents, it’ll tell us, and we can find it and deal with it.”

“Fine,” Red says, and Pink knows they’re not imagining the irritation in her voice. “And if it shows nothing but us, then we can go back to making sure the ship doesn’t fall apart.”

Pink nods.

They move as a clump, this time up to admin, which is a room not exactly designed for six people, so they all cram in around the computer.

“This will track every lifeform on the ship,” Red says, punching some keys, seemingly at random. “If your black slime is anywhere, it will tell us.”

It seems to take ages to come to life, staying on a loading screen for so long that Pink wonders if it’s broken. But eventually it pops up a map of the entire ship. A map of the entire ship showing six lifeforms, all of them in the administrative office.

There is silence for a good while.

“It isn’t human,” Pink says, slowly, grasping at straws. “So maybe it doesn’t—“

“This system tracks movement, heat, any signs of life,” Red interrupts, her voice quite cold now. “Pink, there is nothing alive on this ship other than the six people in this room right now.”

“But—“

“The ship maybe be a piece of shit,” Yellow says, quietly, tone comforting. “But the security systems are all well maintained. Pink, there’s nothing.”

Pink shakes their head, unable to accept it, but unable to argue.

“Bro,” Orange is drumming her fingers on the desk. “Can I go back to work now?”

“Yes,” Red says. “Everyone go back to your tasks. Hopefully we have put Pink’s mind at ease with this.”

Pink doesn’t answer. They watch the screen as the rest of the crew file out watching the little blips of life move around the ship. Now there are only two lifeforms in admin.

Yellow puts their arm around Pink’s shoulder, and this time, Pink doesn’t shove them off.

“There’s no one on the ship but us six, Pink,” They say, quietly. Pink turns to look at them, wishing they could see their face. But they can’t. As they stare at Yellow’s helmet, a shudder runs down their spine. They try to pull away, but Yellow’s grip is strong.

“I... I need to go...,” They stammer. “I better clean up the mess I made, you know?”

“Yeah, of course,” Yellow loosens their grip, but it feels reluctant.

“I’ll see you around,” Pink says quietly, backing out of admin, fighting the overwhelming urge to flee from their friend.

“Yeah, man,” Yellow says, eyes still glued on the screen that shows where every single crew member is. “Yeah. You definitely will.”

And Pink can hear the grin in their voice.


	2. Reactor Meltdown

Pink is afraid. Jumping at shadows, unable to focus on their tasks. They had been warned that the first time out in a ship like this would be disorienting, some even said paranoia inducing, since there was so much that could go wrong. But this wasn’t that. Something already had gone wrong, Pink is certain. They just can’t figure out what it is yet. Their next task is set to be in electrical, but as they approach the dark opening, they hesitate. You can’t see into it from the hallway. Anything could happen in there.

After hesitating outside the entrance for what feels like an eternity, Pink elects to skip it for now. True, the tasks are listed in order of priority, and they really are supposed to be rerouting power to the shields, they turn around and head to do the next task on the list.

Navigation is far more spacious, and the hallway leading up to it is well-lit. Safe feeling. They pass Green on the way in, and they wave at him, but of course he ignores that. He won’t make any friends that way, but maybe he isn’t looking to make friends. Maybe he’s just looking to get paid. Not that Pink could blame him for that.

The navigation system on The Skeld is so old that the route needs to be recalibrated periodically, or the ship could end up way off course. Pink finds themself taking far longer doing this than they need to, because they dread heading back down that hallway and going into electrical.

They almost jump out of their skin when an alarm goes off. The emergency meeting button? Has someone else seen the slime? Tripping over their own feet, they stumble out of navigation and are halfway to the cafeteria before they realize that the alarm has a different source.

There is a warning flashing on the corner of their helmet’s display.

**Reactor Meltdown**

That doesn’t sound good.

* * *

Pink knows what to do during a reactor meltdown, of course. It was part of their training. But it was a part that they had assumed they would never have to use. If anything goes wrong with the reactor, there is a legitimate chance that it could blow, killing everyone on board. During a situation like this, there’s less than a minute to get it under control. Unfortunately, navigation is about as far from the reactor as you can be while still being on the ship, and the suits don’t actually allow you to move all that quickly.

When the burst through the door, Yellow, Orange, and Red are already there. Stabilizing the reactor is a two person job, so they technically don’t even need to be there, but protocol says that everyone on the ship needs to be present in these emergencies, in case for some reason the two who show up are incapable of fixing it.

“What happened?” Yellow asks, hovering anxiously over Red’s shoulder as she finished up her end of the stabilization. At the other end of the room, Orange is just finishing as well, and the alarm thankfully stops. Pink’s ears continue ringing.

“No idea,” Red says, and she sounds worried, which is entirely reasonable, given what just happened. “Diagnostics isn’t exactly giving me much to go on.” She frowns down at the screen — at least, Pink assumes she is frowning. Any other facial expression in this situation would simply be odd.

“Shit’s weird,” Orange adds helpfully.

“Hmm,” Red turns towards them. “Where are Purple and Green? There’s been more than enough time for them to get here.”

“Maybe they figured we had it covered?” Yellow offers.

“That’s not how this works.”

“Obviously I know that,” They reply. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

“The only thing I can figure from looking at the diagnostics is that the failsafes were shut off somehow,” Red mutters, more to herself than anyone else in the room by the sound of it. “But I don’t see how that could have been done by accident...” Trailing off, she leaves that thought hanging in the air. It isn’t a pleasant one.

A second passes. Then two. Then three.

Orange coughs. “We should probably find Purple and Green before having this convo.”

“You seriously think one of us did this on purpose?” Yellow sounds one part amused and two parts incredulous, and maybe a tad bit insulted.

“No,” Red says, but cautiously. Like she doesn’t want to commit to anything yet. “Pink, you haven’t said anything yet.” It isn’t a question, or even an encouragement to speak. Just an observation.

“I just...,” They look around, trying to steady their nerves. “I’m just a bit shaken. You know? We could have... You know. You know.”

Red nods, seeming to accept that Pink’s silence is due to shock at the recent near death experience, and perhaps it is, at least partially. But their mind is racing. They cannot get the image of that slime out of their head.

It’s still on the ship. They know it is. As Red, Orange, and Yellow do final checks on the reactor, to ensure that there will not be a repeat performance, Pink scans the shadows. They imagine they can see it slinking around in the darkness, waiting to strike. Though they only saw it for a moment, Pink is utterly convinced that whatever it was, it wanted to hurt them. And how could they believe that this malfunction was entirely unrelated?

Something is wrong on this mission, that much they know for sure. But they say nothing. What can they even say? _Hey guys, remember that slime that none of you believed I ever saw in the first place? What if, and bear with me here, but what if it was responsible for this meltdown?_ Ha. As if.

“You good, man?” Yellow asks, snapping Pink back to reality.

“Yeah. Yeah. Of course,” They say, and it doesn’t sound at all convincing. Yellow is staring at them, and Pink tries to conjure up their face, the expression it would have, but all they see is helmet.

“Don’t get weird on me,”Yellow says with a laugh, and Pink tries to join in, but their own laugh sounds so strained and pathetic that they quickly stop.

“I suppose we should call an emergency meeting,” Red says with a sigh. It seems that she and Orange have finished whatever they were doing at the reactor. Pink suddenly feels very useless, but in their defence, the two of them seemed just fine. No help needed.

“I can’t believe Green and Purple still haven’t showed up,” Yellow makes a _tsk tsk_ noise, clearly still not taking this entirely seriously.

“You’d think they would at least want to make sure we weren’t all going to die,” Orange agrees.

“Green I get,” Red continues talking as she leads them all towards the cafeteria. “He’s a little odd, I don’t really know him. But I’ve flown with Purple before, he’s not the sort to slack on duties. I don’t like this.”

No one seems to know what to say to that, so they move along in silence. The Skeld isn’t big, but they do not run into Green or Purple on their way. A horrible feeling has settled into the pit of Pink’s stomach, and it feels like they’re going to throw up. They don’t, luckily, because that would be disgusting to have in their helmet. At no point do they stop looking for the slime from the airlock.

“You guys hear that?” Orange says, coming to such a sudden stop that Pink nearly runs into them.

“Hear what?” Red turns back to look at her.

“I don’t know, it sounds like...,”She looks around. “You really don’t hear anything?”

“Not really,” Yellow says.

“I think it’s coming from in here. Maybe?” The four of them are standing outside the med-bay. Orange peers inside, but the lights are out, which is an odd thing in and of itself. “I’m gonna just take a quick peek, I’ll catch up.”

Pink’s tongue manages to unstick itself from the roof of their mouth at that. “Are you sure you should be going in alone?”

Orange laughs. “Why? You think that mold you saw earlier is going to attack me?”

Even Yellow lets out a small chuckle at that, so Pink says nothing. Because that’s exactly what they think. The other crewmates didn’t see it. Pink can’t expect them to understand. But it was dangerous.

Orange disappears into the darkened med-bay, and even though she said to go on to the cafeteria without her, no one moves. Even if the others don’t believe Pink, they can sense that something isn’t right on the ship.

And hanging back to wait for Orange turns out to have been a good idea, because less than a second after the lights in the Med-Bay are turned on, a scream tears out of the room that would put any 1980s scream queen to shame.

Pink, who had been half expecting something, is the first to run in after her, though Yellow and Red aren’t far behind. Pink can see Orange standing, trembling, staring around the back corner, into the area where the scanner and testing equipment is. She doesn’t look hurt. As Pink approaches her, they almost want to hope it was a joke. It’s something Orange would do, especially given how jumpy Pink has been. She loves to fuck with people.

Then they see what it is she’s staring at.

Something about the suits makes it hard to remember that there’s a person inside. You start to think of them as nothing more than the bits of fabric and plastic and god knows what else all stitched together. You forget that, underneath all that, is a flesh and blood human being.

Flesh and blood seems to be all that remains of Purple. His suit has been torn open, and so has he. Pink never did well in biology, so they have no idea what they’re looking at, but some of those glistening lumps have to be organs. Viscera has been repurposed as a noose, tied around Purple’s neck, as if whoever killed him had intended to string him up somewhere, but for some reason left the job unfinished. His helmet is still on, so Pink can’t see his face, but they can’t deny that he’s human. Or was human. The evidence of that is scattered all around their feet.

“Jesus fuck,” Yellow breathes.

Red says nothing, but from the retching noise, it sounds like she was less successful than Pink was at not vomiting in her helmet.

“What did you do?” Orange’s voice comes out in an uncharacteristic whimper. “What did you do, Green?”

Green?

That’s when Pink sees him. He had wedged himself back into the corner. It isn’t an exceptionally good hiding place, but given the presence of a mutilated corpse in the room, it’s easy to understood how Pink had initially overlooked him.

Even from this distance, Pink can see that his suit is spattered with blood. Caught red-handed is an understatement. Pink also notices the footprints. A mess of bloody footprints lead from Purple’s corpse to the back of the room where Green is cowering, and none lead in the other direction.

“What the fuck, Green?” Yellow’s voice is hoarse. It sounds like they’re trying valiantly to choke back tears.

Green doesn’t answer the questions posed to him. Green doesn’t look up at the people who have entered the room. From where he has attempted to hide himself in the corner, he stares intently at the body of Purple. Pink takes their eyes off of him only to scan the room for that black slime, but it’s nowhere to be seen.

“Guys,” Green says, finally, still not looking up from Purple, his voice completely hollow sounding. “Guys, I think Purple is hurt.”

The silence that follows this statement is agonizingly long.

“Oh my god,” Orange mutters.

“We have to help him,” Green continues, his tone still entirely void of emotion.

Red looks around at her crewmates, a helpless energy around her.

“He’s lost his mind,” Yellow says, and no one disagrees with them.

They all just stand there and stare at Green, covered in his crewmate’s blood, seemingly unaware of his own heinous act.

Because of course Green killed Purple.

Who else could it have been?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Sorry this chapter is a bit shorter than the last, but I’m just terrible at length consistency so that’s how it goes. I have the full fic outlined, gonna be six more chapters after this. I’ll try to update regularly, like 1-2 times a week, but no promises. Grad school is kicking my ass, you know?

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed the start of this little project! I played a bunch of this game with my friends (yes I main pink), and it seemed like a fun concept for a more serious horror story. I’m quite busy with school so I couldn’t begin to guess the schedule this will be updated on, but I’m having fun writing it and that’s what matters honestly.


End file.
